Chương 80: The Hourglass, and a Timeline Running Off Course

Inside Lucian's spatial ring, the black-wax-sealed dispatch suddenly began radiating a burning heat. Lucian reached in, pulled out the sheet of parchment, and set it on the table. The blood-red hourglass emblem in the corner of the letter blazed with brilliant crimson light. The magical grains of sand inside began flowing upward, backward, twice the normal speed, letting out an eerie whirring sound, like metal bending in on itself in space.

At the bottom of the letter, a fresh line of handwriting slowly formed in fresh blood, visible in the candlelight.

'The Regressor is watching your actions from the shadows.' Eleanor spread a three-dimensional military map from the Ministry of Defense across the ebony table, pointing directly at a treacherous V-shaped ravine along the western border.

"This is Broken Wind Ravine. All one hundred thousand soldiers of the 4th Legion are pinned at the bottom of the valley. The Void Beasts have sealed off the only entrance." Sylvia stood beside her, opening chapter forty-five of The Elegy of the Nameless Knight, Volume 2, laying the book side by side with the military map. She cross-referenced the two terrain diagrams, then looked up at Lucian.

"Lucian... in chapter forty-five, the Nameless Knight leads his troops into a ravine exactly like this one to make his last stand. He then opens a secret escape route behind the cliff wall, called 'the Silent Wind Path,' to slip behind the enemy and destroy them completely." Sylvia pointed to the rear cliff face of Broken Wind Ravine on the real terrain map.

"But the actual geography of Broken Wind Ravine... behind it is a sheer cliff face, three thousand meters straight up. There's no escape route of any kind." She looked up at Lucian.

"The Commanding Officer of the 4th Legion... is leading the entire hundred thousand troops deeper into the ravine, searching for the path from your book." BOOM! Lucian's forehead dropped straight onto the ebony desk, letting out a hollow thud. He clutched his head in both hands, his whole body trembling in absolute despair.

"I drew that map with ketchup on a breakfast plate when I was a kid! The cook had made fried eggs that day, and I swiped some ketchup across the plate to draw a ravine with a back exit, just to hit an extra five hundred words for the System's quota! There's no damn hidden path behind a three-thousand-meter cliff in real life!" Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Evelyn, checking her arcane rifle's magazine nearby, stopped and pushed her glasses up, staring at him.

"So... a hundred thousand soldiers on the front line are risking their lives holding the line, waiting for an escape route drawn in ketchup?"

"Exactly!" Lucian lifted his head, eyes bloodshot with fury.

"Are they insane?! It clearly says fictional entertainment novel — why is anyone using a storybook map as real battle strategy?!" Eleanor stood beside him, looking at the red mark on Lucian's forehead and the tension on his face, unlike anything she'd seen from him before. She stepped closer and rested a hand on his shoulder.

"They don't know it's fiction, Lucian. The soldiers on the front line only know that book has correctly predicted every turn of this war so far. They believe in you." Lucian sat frozen in his chair. He could ignore the Church, crush trade guilds, casually pocket betting winnings and dodge millions in taxes without a second thought.

But a hundred thousand people out there — poor soldiers who used to gather around his tattered book at the estate gates, children who'd worn his black cloak — were about to be ground into pulp because of a ketchup smear he'd drawn as a child. The conscience of someone who'd once lived in a civilized world wouldn't let him sit in an air-conditioned room counting money while a hundred thousand lives were buried alive because of his own laziness. Ting! A dim black Unified System v2.

0 notification burst into view before him. [CONTINENTAL-SCALE FIELD MISSION ACTIVATED!] Mission name: 'WORLD SYNTAX ERROR CORRECTION' (TIMELINE CORRECTION). Objective: Reach Broken Wind Ravine, rescue the entire 4th Frontline Legion before the defense line collapses. Time limit: 72 hours! [COMPLETION REWARD:] Unlock the Fifth Ancient Language: DRACONIC DIALECT, 100%! Unlock Divine-Tier Terrain Restructuring Power! Lucian shot up out of his chair.

He tore off his Academy uniform coat and tossed it aside, throwing on his ash-grey, black-trimmed traveling cloak. He grabbed the leather satchel holding every mana-restoration elixir and his silver dagger, snapping the equipment case shut with a hard click. He turned to face the four others in the room.

"Pack up. We're taking a little trip to the western border." CLANG! Astra drew the Sun-Slaying Dragon Sword half an inch out of its sheath, holy light blazing in her eyes.

"I'll clear the path ahead. Anyone who gets in your way, I'll cut down." Sylvia quickly rolled up all the real terrain maps and slid them into a leather tube, pinning the jeweled quill to her chest.

"I've already prepared the coordinates for every magical relay station along the route." Evelyn racked her arcane rifle with a sharp click, tucking three compressed arcane grenades into her jacket.

"If the ravine has no escape route... I brought enough explosives to blow a brand-new one through that three-thousand-meter mountain myself." Eleanor straightened her gold-plated breastplate and strode over to throw the door open.

"The Royal armored express carriage is standing by in the back courtyard. Every border checkpoint has already received orders to clear the way, absolutely." The five of them stepped out of the villa together, heading straight for the courtyard in the dead of night. BOOM! Evelyn's ten-ton armored carriage, fitted with four arcane jet engines, roared to life like a prehistoric beast.

Its four tracked wheels crushed through the ice and snow on the road, tearing through the Golden Gate of the capital of Solaris amid a raging blizzard, ripping through the darkness, heading straight for the burning cauldron of Broken Wind Ravine on the western front.